Now what? ProgressNow says Don’t shop union?

So it is screwy, this campaign by ProgressNow Colorado[1] to create an interactive Internet map to help progressives find a NON-union[2] grocery to shop in.

I was left scratching my head last weekend, when the first of the e-mails started.

ProgressNow talked up its map with Yes-We-Can verve about sticking it to the corporate tightwads at King Soopers[3], City Market[4], Albertsons[5] and Safeway stores, where thousands of union workers are toiling without a contract.

And though there isn’t a strike at present, the maps (so customizable you can search by ZIP code) are already up and running. Thanks to ProgressNow, I’ve already found several alternatives to my neighborhood store, which is staffed by United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7[10] members.

Granted, the progressive advocates are in a difficult spot. They know that because you have to eat to live, shoppers are going to go somewhere in the event of a strike. And with the big chains agreeing to lock out workers in the event of strikes[11] at any one chain, it’s impossible for ProgressNow to promote a union alternative.

But this map business appears a strange new tactic, and Migoya has committed journalism in explaining why the ProgressNow alternative may backfire for the union workers it hopes to protect.

“In an economy where supermarkets battle with discount, no-frills stores for every consumer dollar, industry analysts say it’s one thing to tell consumers to shop elsewhere and quite another to show them,” Migoya writes.

“’Competitors are the only ones to win in that strategy,’” Andrew Wolf, an industry analyst, told Migoya.

The reporter points to a strike in Southern California involving the UFCW in 2004 after a four-and-a-half-month standoff cost the grocery chain $2 billion.

Wolf said that it took months before the companies started to show a profit again. (And there had been no fancy interactive Internet maps available in that standoff.)

Just so we’re all on the same page, it is very difficult to employ workers if your company isn’t making a profit. (Being in newspapers, this is something I can say with unqualified certainty.)

UFCW officials say they’re waiting for the go-head from Washington headquarters to strike. They’ve been without a contract for months, and at issue are disagreements over wages, health care benefits and pensions.

Meanwhile, grocery store owners are doing well as more people are staying in to eat during the recession.

My sincerest hope is this all blows over without strikes and lockouts. I’ve been dreading not being able to shop in my neighborhood store.

Who wants to cross a picket line manned by good and decent people you interact with every few days?